To charge this much for childminding

[Anothertiredmom]

posting on behalf of friend who’s not on mumsnet

friend has recently qualified as a childminder. They’ve been working out their fees with the agency who qualified them.

The feedback from a lot of enquiries has been that it’s too expensive and she’s now lost 3 potential customers due to this.

so she wants to know a general opinion on costs please

If you use one, how much do you pay for your childminder? Per hour/per day/wrap around care

she’s been advised to charge around £6 an hour, £52-56 per day(7.30-5.30), and £35 for wrap around care. Snacks are included in wrap around, extra food cost is added for hourly and day rates or they can provide their own.

do you think this is unreasonably high?

I understand it changes based on location, this is for outside of London, midlands town.

Sounds very high to me. Thinking about the amount I earn per day I would come away with about £20 a day out of my earnings. You need to think about the ratio of children in your care, expenses going out and the amount you need to live on.then determine if that's a justified figure. Check what others in the area are charging. How much is a nursery for example. For someone on a low wage these rates would make returning to work out of the question.

I’m a childminder, in London, and my fees are £60 per day and £25 for wrap around care. I provide breakfast, hot meal
at lunch, all drinks and snacks but not an evening meal. All outings and activities are included too.
Your friend needs to do some research on what local minders charge as if she prices herself too high, she won’t get any clients. If the agency she’s with is the one who takes a percentage of fees, that will be why they are telling her to charge a high fee!

Good grief ! …Maybe People should stay home and look after their own children - £6 an hour is not unreasonable !!!!!!!!!
Ofsted Registered Childminders have to train extensively, keep up to date with legislation, take paediatric first aid and safeguarding courses, write Policies, Procedures, Contracts, etc and look after little people professionally. I should imagine the ‘Agency’ Childminders do the same; therefore

£6 per Hour (does vary around the Country) seems reasonable to me…

I'm a childminder and charge £6.50 which includes everything - nappies, home cooked meals, snacks, trips. I haven't put my prices up for 4 years, and have always been full with a waiting list. South East

I pay my childminder around £1300 per month for wraparound care for two children (it varies slightly with school holidays, length of month etc.)

They attend from 8am and she takes them to school for an 8.50 start Tuesday to Friday. She collects them daily at 3.20pm, and has them until 4.30 two nights per week and 5.30 on the other three. I provide drinks and snacks. She works her rate out hourly, more for before 8am and after 5.30pm, but I can't remember either rate, she just lets me know towards the end of the month how much next month will be and I send it over. She does a full breakdown, but I've used her for a couple of years and trust her implicitly, so I never check it.

Should have added, that's north east England (County Durham)

Never used childminder- kids went to nursery. Teens now.But thinking about it - dog walkers in my area charge £10+ per hour! I suppose all based on location. Very difficult for working mums with young kids.

We're in the midlands, I pay £65 for a 7.30-5.30 day. Childminder charges £6.50 an hour and we provide all meals (childminder provides fruit snacks), wipes, nappies and clothing.
Our nurseries around here charge more than we are paying the childminder, and she's amazing. Does loads of activities with the kids, she's lovely and is teaching them the pre school curriculum.
I happily pay £6.50 an hour because of how great she is. I've had a cheaper childminder with my son and she didn't really do much with the kids at all!

Leicester area. I have had 3 childminders and they vary from £3-4 per hour with a min of 2 hours. Before and after school was £12 from 8 am and pick up at 5pm.
My new CM charges £13.50 for after school including pick up and dinner with 6pm pick up.
It is hard to find a CM where I live and they get places filled really quickly but they all charge about the same.

This is far too much IMO. I pay £13.50 for after school till 6pm including school pick up and a meal. My previous CM charged £12 a day, 8am drop off and walk to school, after school till 5pm with snack.
After school club run at my child's school by local nursery is 3.15-6pm and £13 including dinner.
Parents don't care about locally sourced food etc, they need reasonable prices otherwise they are working just to pay for childcare.

she has 2 children herself who she has to count in the ratios, and 4 days a week when her youngest returns from nursery at 5.30

I'm not familiar with childminders who have their own young children, the ones I know have school aged children. But is it normal for them to send their children to nursery when they're caring for other people's children?

Crumbs. London, but 14 years ago I paid £7 p/h! and that was sort of middleish for a CM.

Wrap-around is tricky. Why not avoid it, to start with at least, and then see how things work out once little ones move on to school. Most CMs I knew only did it when they had the younger sibling all day anyway, and/or stopped mid-way through the reception year. In-school wraparound will always be cheaper IME, but is tough on little ones.

I had an agreement with mine where I paid £2.50 per half hour rounded up with snacks included and same rate if I was late. About nine years ago. £6 seems a little high whereas £3 per half hour if they're doing 3:30-5pm everyday would be £9 and not £12 and a little friendlier sounding. (Your friend will probably end up doing until 5.15 which would be £12 anyway!) I would suspect £5.50 is probably more usual in the area or maybe even £5 for any child over seven.

@Whinge i asked this at first too, but he gets his 30 free hours and was already at nursery so she doesn’t want to uproot him, also the dynamic of him being at home might make things harder ie he’d feel like other kids are playing with all his toys etc and would obviously expect mommy to treat him differently which might be hard to deal with. Also she will make more money if he’s at nursery giving her an extra space for a child at home if that makes sense

We pay £4.50 per hour but this includes no food, we provide lunch/ snacks and pay £2 a day for dinner. We are in the midlands 👌🏼

£75 a day 8am to 6pm here, me London.?no reduction for late start or early pick up.,

It's £75 per (ten hour) day with my CM in London or £10 per hour before or after school.

My daughter pay this amount for her son and his creche offer a similar level of feeding etc. They are city based but not London.

What a bizarre thread. She's running a business. the right price is what people will pay. If she's full, she can keep nudging her fees up until people won't pay them anymore. If she's empty, she needs to reduce them. There's no right price

We pay £4.20 per hour to our childminder. It includes snacks, arts materials etc. £6 sounds a lot to me!

Surely it’s a least minimum wage?

Would you work for £6 per hour?

It’s not £6 an hour though, you’d have more than one child at a time so could be £12 or £18 or more depending on ratios and ages.

My friend is a childminder in Cotswolds. She charges £75 per day. 8am to 5.30pm. And they pay it. For one year, the parents left both their kids with her. £150 a day! And she always pays cash.

Self employed people often don't make minimum wage.